


The Infinite Ways Series

by Writeonthrough (Schroederplayspiano)



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-26
Updated: 2018-06-26
Packaged: 2019-05-28 18:45:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 5,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15055400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Schroederplayspiano/pseuds/Writeonthrough
Summary: The Infinite Ways Bellamy Could Possibly Find Out About Clarke’s Radio Calls:A series of oneshots featuring various unlikely possibilities Bellamy could discover the secret Clarke's not telling him.Posted on AO3 for your enjoyment. Originally posted on Tumblr.





	1. Signals in the Atmosphere

“Hey, hey,” Madi enters Polis’ concealed electric room to find Bellamy, Monty, and Harper gathered around the center table. She turns back to Clarke, who closes the door behind her. “Looks like we found where the cool people hang out…”

Clarke squeezes Madi’s shoulders, warning her to stop talking.

“Alright, so…” Monty updates the group. “I have access to their laser com—which can pick up radio signals through what’s left of the radiation, but all other access to their ship, including their cameras, is encrypted, Raven—”

Clarke nods. “Can we do anything to override their laser com in the meantime?”

“Override it?” Monty furrows his brow. “It allows us to hear all their battle plans so we can be at least one step ahead of them.

While Monty considers Clarke’s idea and mentally balances the risk factors, Harper voices one of his concerns, “I thought our main concern was their cameras…”

“It is,” Bellamy assures her. “If Echo and Raven decrypt their cameras and we override their laser coms—”

“—We’d have control of their entire communication system between the sky and the ground,” Clarke finishes for him.

Monty refocuses on the computer, “I’m not sure it’s possible…hold on…”

They wait in silence as Monty hammers away at the keyboard. “Hey…” His brow furrows in confusion again. “What the —? There’s another signal in the atmosphere.”

“What?” Bellamy rushes to the computer to investigate.

The keyboard clicks one final time, and a familiar static suddenly beams through the speakers—sending a chill down Clark’s spine.

“Hey, guys…” Her whisper is almost inaudible over the static. “I don’t think—”

Then her world explodes:

“Bellamy–” Static. “56 days—” As the static crumbles Clarke’s voice again, all eyes turn to Clarke, who—for a different reason—can’t quite believe what she’s hearing. “—Pain and suffering?” Static eats her words again. “Ignore me, okay? I haven’t had water in two days—”

The first audible sentence jolts Clarke into action. “Turn it off!!” She bounds across the large cement table for the computer. “Monty!”

“I just want to say—” Static. “Don’t feel bad—” More static. “—Me here.”

Everything else disappears as Clarke reaches across the table. “Monty! Turn it off!”

“Clarke?” Bellamy’s voice breaks as begins to fully understand the magnitude of what he’s hearing.

“Monty!” Clarke’s volume increases, but when that doesn’t work, she slides off the table to run around it.

Then the feed breaks off to complete silence. Everyone freezes.

“HI BELLAMY!” Madi’s eight-year-old voice booms through the airwaves.

“Hey…” A twelve-year-old, present-day Madi, lights up. “I know what these are…They’re Clarke’s daily radio calls to Bellamy.”

Before anyone can speak, the radio voice continues. “Clarke’s not doing well today—” Static cuts off any explanation. “So whatever your reasons for not calling us back, now would be a really—”

Loud electrical feedback cuts Madi’s voice off, causing everyone to wince and cover their ears. Several moments pass until they’re able to recover and notice Clarke, with her back to them—heaving in emotion, holding onto ripped-out cords from the wall socket.

“Clarke…” Bellamy pleads.

She continues to heave, silent tears—blocked from view—run down her cheeks. Bellamy reaches out, but before he makes contact, she shivers away. “Leave. Me. Alone!” Clarke cries, running from the room.

Bellamy runs after her, but Madi steps in front of him. “I got it,” she promises, following Clarke out the door.


	2. The Notebook

“You’re quiet again,” Bellamy notes, watching Clarke from across the Polis campfire. “I would have never described you as quiet.” When she looks up at him, he shrugs. “Contemplative, sure, but never quiet.”

He waits for an explanation, but all she offers is, “I guess you’re not the only one who’s changed.”

“Fair enough,” he whispers over the low crackles of the fire. A lightening streak flashes overhead and tears Bellamy away from Clarke to look at the sky above them. The clouds’ heavy thickness stole the stars and moon from the sky, leaving the flames from the fire as the sole light source. He could feel the storm coming, the pressure change, the air temperate rise, but still he didn’t move. As everyone around them had gone to bed or taken shelter somewhere, he didn’t want to miss the opportunity to be totally alone with Clarke—for some reason, she wasn’t leaving to take cover either. “I just…I could never imagine a day when you were alive and wouldn’t be able to talk to me.”

Clarke scoffs silently to herself, grateful that the crackle of the fire and the roar of thunder prevents Bellamy from hearing it. She waits for the thunder to finish to reply, “Honestly? Neither could I.”

“Okay, then,” Bellamy leans forward at her opening. “Talk to me. Tell me something. Tell me you’re mad at me for leaving without you—”

“I’m not—”

“—tell me how hard it was by yourself here—”

“It—”

“—Tell me how you’ve changed so much that now you won’t even talk to me—”

“I have been talking to you,” Clarke pushes herself up and stands over him, noticing the pitter-patter of raindrops for the first time, “Every. Single. Day for the last for 2,199 days!”

Thunder roars above them, intensifying the rain’s downpour. Now soaked through, Bellamy stands to meet her, his shock highlighted in the lightening streak. “What are you talking about?”

“On the radio!” Clarke’s yells challenge the storm. “I talked to you! I waited for you!”

“No-no, I thought you died from radiation! I couldn’t live with myself for leaving you behind! I mourned you for three years—Clarke!” Bellamy’s explanations fall short when she turns her back and walks away. He lunges for her but she tears her arm from his reach and continues forward, forcing him to run ahead of her. “You radioed me?”

“Yes!” She screams as if she’s releasing torturous pain. “I radioed you!” She leans closer, shortening the distance between them. “I radioed you because you are more important to me than I am to myself. I radioed you every day for six years—”

“You—you—” He struggles to speak, to breath, to stand, as he processes the information.

Clarke breaks down, now able to distinguish between the raindrops and the tear streams running down her face. She struggles as she scans over him–now living, breathing before her–someone she held onto, yearned for, for 2,199 days. “I had you, Bellamy. You kept me going! I wasn’t alone because I talked to you every day!”

Thunder boomed, emphasizing her words. Lighting strikes back, illuminating his wonderment. The downpour continued, rinsing Bellamy and Clarke of everything left unsaid.

Still speechless, he watches her continue in awe. She softens despite the rain, “I thought we completed each other in some ridiculous way. The head and the heart, you know? Through time, space, distance, we were somehow meant to be—”

“We were meant to be!” Bellamy exclaims over the thunder. He surrenders any fight left with his next breath, “We still are meant to be!”

He reaches out fiercely and pulls her to him, curling his fingertips over the curve of her neck as their lips meet in fervor. Rain envelops them and they cling to each other tighter. Bellamy sweeps Clarke off her feet and she wraps herself around him as he carries her to his tent…


	3. The Fairytale

“Madi,” Bellamy finds her sitting by his tent fire. “Were you waiting for me?”

She peers up at him with a nervous smile. “I wanted to tell you a story.”

“I finished for the night,” Bellamy sits and relaxes against a log. “So I could use a good story.”

“First,” she casts a warning glance across the fire. “Clarke’s sleeping and you have to promise me that you won’t go wake her up afterward.”

“I promise,” slides off his tongue.

“Good,” she’s satisfied, and takes a nervous breath before starting:

“Once upon a time, a princess and knight were sent across the stars to a faraway planet with 98 of their friends. The planet was beautiful and green and freeing, but soon, it became clear that freedom wasn’t going to keep their friends alive. No one knew what to do. The princess wanted to lead with her head and the knight wanted to lead with his heart, and they soon found their leading styles only worked for so long…”

Bellamy pushes himself up, firelight reflecting in his wide eyes as he stares at Madi with awe.

“While both the princess and the knight wanted to do the best thing for their people, the answer wasn’t clear. It can’t be clear in either-or situations: not when people think they have choose between their heads and their hearts—”

“Madi…”

“Shh!” She waves him off. “I’m telling a story…the young leaders couldn’t figure it out. They were each so stubborn in holding onto what they thought was right. Still, the princess and the knight came to depend on each other—to trust each other. Through separation after separation, and fight after stupid fight, they always came back together, knowing they led better together than apart…”

Bellamy leans towards Madi. “Clarke told you all of this?”

She ignores him, “Eventually the knight realized that he needed the princess, wanted her by his side, in his life, because when she was with him he felt stronger, more complete, and everything made more sense. But every time he tried to tell her, they would be separated again or she would annoyingly cut him off—”

“How could you possibly know that?”

“I know everything,” she smirks. “It’s always easier for the heart to feel first and think later. The head can be so annoying because it thinks and overthinks and waits until it’s too late to surrender itself to the heart… So, when the knight and the princess are torn apart for six years by distance and time—the princess’s head and the knight’s heart switch places because it’s the only way they know how to stay alive…”

“Madi…”

“She didn’t tell me that part, I figured it out,” she points out then continues, “The knight becomes all thoughtful and the leader the princess told him to be—moving on to someone new because that’s what his head tells him to do. Meanwhile, without anything threatening her life, the princess finally can live, breathe, feel. But without the knight by her side—the princess realizes it’s not just that she needs the knight, she wants him with her—wherever she goes…so she carries him in her heart, talking to him and sharing everything that happens to her on a radio every day and it makes her so happy—”

“Wait—” A jolt races through Bellam spine. “Clarke talked to me on a radio?”

“Every day,” Madi emphasizes with a side-glance. “But when the knight finally returns to the princess—things aren’t the same anymore. And the princess’ daughter realizes—the epic fairytale that’s been told to her for six years, was nothing but a story with a fictional ending—because the knight’s head doesn’t realize that his moving on has totally broken the princess’ heart.”

“Wha—?” Unable to think, he moves. He stands. He sits. His jaw drops. He clenches it closed. He steps towards Clarke’s tent…

“Whoa, hey,” Madi rushes to stop him. “You promised.”

Bellamy’s anguish mars his face as he silently begs to pass.

“No. Let her sleep,” Madi demands. “Start mending her heart tomorrow.”


	4. Madi’s Ultimatum

“We clearly did not finish our earlier conversation,” Bellamy declares as Clarke scrambles around the tent gathering belongings. “You’re not leaving alone,” he reaches for her, but she yanks away. “Clarke!”

Madi watches their back and forth. “Aren’t you guys supposed to have more respectful, two-sided arguments? Clarke, since when do you not talk to Bellamy? And Bellamy—since when do you not respect her decisions?”

“I’m done with respecting decisions that separate us,” Bellamy tells Clarke. “I can’t lose you again.”

But she ignores him. “There’s no argument, Madi. You and I leaving. Now.”

“Okay. Fine.” Madi enunciates, then stands to challenge her. “I’ll leave with you on one condition.”

“No one is leaving and no one has conditions.” Bellamy reiterates, “We’ll find a way to make sure Madi is safe.”

“I don’t do ultimatums, Madi—”

“Tell Bellamy about the radio, then,” Madi’s heightened pre-teen attitude adds an arrogant shrug. “I’ll go with you.”

Everything halts. The ground under Clarke crumbles and she leans into a rucksack for support.

“What radio?” Bellamy turns from Clarke to Madi and back to Clarke again, his long curls swishing side to side as he does so. When no one answers, he asks louder, “What radio?!?”

“Madi, come on—”

“No-no,” she cuts Clarke off. “Somebody has to stand up for you and if you won’t do then I will—” Madi pivots to a half-confused, half-concerned Bellamy, “While you were gone—”

A powerful force possesses Clarke, compelling her to step in front of Madi and face Bellamy. “I tried calling you on the radio—it obviously didn’t work, so don’t worry about it.”

All color drains from Bellamy’s face. Buried emotions come to the surface as endless questions swirl his head. “You called me on the radio?” He swallows, trying to steady himself. “When?”

“Bellamy, I promise, I will talk to you about this—but let’s not have this conversation right now.”

“When, Clarke?” Bellamy insists. “How?” She doesn’t answer and he remembers “…The radiation blocked all radio signals.”

“Yeah…” She speaks softly, raising her eyebrows. “Monty said something about that…”

Bellamy steps closer, “When did you call me?”

“Every day, okay?” Madi interjects. “She called you on the radio every, single day.”

“What?”

“For 2,199 days.”

“Stop it, Madi!” Clarke yanks her around until their eyes meet—then the girl sees Clarke’s all-encompassing fear and surrenders.

Bellamy’s voice shakes. “Clarke?”

“No-no,” she shakes her head as she turns back to him, unable to meet his intense gaze. “It’s not what you think and you don’t understand—”

“Then explain it to me.”

“They weren’t—It—Can we not make this a big deal? Talking on the radio was just a way to keep me sane—”

“Bullshit,” Madi interjects. “You had me for that.”

“Madi,” Bellamy asks softly. “Can Clarke and I talk for a minute?”

“Does this mean we’re not leaving?”

“Now!” Clarke and Bellamy say together, finding agreement for the first time.

Somehow, their heightened emotions fill the empty space in the tent, making it harder to breathe.

“It’s big deal to me,” Bellamy declares, breathless.

“Okay…Good.”

“Good?”

“I—I—you know—this is not the time—”

“It’s never the time with us, Clarke.”

“Believe me, I get that,” she steps towards him. “But this is a longer conversation that I cannot have right now. It’s not like it was the same SOS message—none of them, actually, were SOS messages—”

“Apart from a longer conversation, which we will find time to have. I’ve been trying to talk to you for days and you haven’t said anything. So—” he crosses his arms, “Is there anything you want to tell me?”

Her heart beats. Her head dizzies. Then everything fades, “Talking to you on that radio—You’re the reason I survived. You’re the reason I had hope. You’re—” He reaches out to cradle her face, gently stroking her cheeks as she leans into him. “Bellamy, you’re all my reasons.”


	5. Under The Stars

“Couldn’t sleep?”

Clarke spins around on the rover’s hood to find Bellamy standing beside it. “Just enjoying the quiet night.”

“So you drive half a mile from camp,” he steps up the car and slides beside her. “To be alone and stargaze?”

“Sounds about right,” she leans back on the hood, placing an arm behind her head for support. “My tolerance for camp noise has diminished over six years.”

“Makes sense.”

“Doesn’t explain what you’re doing here.”

Bellamy shifts towards her while she continues to fixate overhead. “I panicked when I couldn’t find you.“

She sighs deeply, “Well, you found me.”

“No, you don’t understand—Clarke—” He waits until she redirects her focus to him. “I relive the trauma of leaving you behind whenever someone else I love leaves me.”

“Bellamy—”

“For six years, I lived with the fact that I didn’t wait for you—that I left you behind.”

“You did the right thing. I’m proud of—”

“I thought you died,” he emphasizes and she’s shocked by the depth of his pained expression in the moonlight. “Don’t you get that?”

“I—”

“I grieved you. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t eat. I kept you in my head, Clarke. Within days, I was talking to you like you were still around; asking you what I should do—what I should say. And somehow, you answered. Days turned to months and your voice gradually merged with the voice inside my head and I couldn’t tell them apart anymore.”

“And what was I supposed to think, huh?” she sits up. “When all of my messages to you went unanswered? When you didn’t return after five years?”

“What messages?”

She shakes her head. “You knew I had nightblood, Bellamy. How could you not know there was a chance I was alive?” Her voice breaks and a tear runs down her cheek. “After all we’d been through together—where was your faith?”

“Clarke…”

“You mourned me and moved on. Fine.” She squeezes her eyes shut for a moment, but another tear escapes. “But, Bellamy, I held onto you. I held onto you when I had nothing left, and you were enough to keep me going. I talked to you, I called you on the radio every day were gone—2,199 days—and I told you I still had hope you I’d see you again.” Clarke waits for a response, searching his watery eyes, but none came. “As long as I was still breathing, I still had hope…so, why didn’t you?”

She keeps his gaze as they both process the raw emotion in the other’s expression. A soft breeze blows through the desert that scoops up her hair and ruffles his curls. Still neither moves.

Bellamy swallows, “You have to understand. I was so in love with you that leaving you behind—it nearly killed me.” He blinks and the tears flow. “If I held on to any hope you were alive…If I knew you were down here alone…It would have destroyed whatever part of me I had left.”

Clarke takes time to absorb his emotion, then nods in understanding. She leans back against the hood and returns to the stars. His brow wrinkles in confusion. Then she continues, “You know, I don’t think Bellamy Blake and Clarke Griffin should be without each other.”

“Hmm,” he follows her movements, lying close enough to feel her breathing. “I agree.”

She closes the distance between them by resting her head on his heart. “I hope they’re never separated ever again,” she professes to the stars.

He watches her wish for the two of them and smiles softly. He touches his head to hers, whispering, “Me too.”


	6. How We Met

“There you are!” Bellamy’s voice booms through the underground hallway. He hurries down it. “Madi. You can’t hide down here and not tell us where you are.”

“I was training. Clarke—”

“Clarke has been really worried about you!” Emotion flows out as he defends Clarke. “Your confiding in Octavia has made her really upset! You know she’s thinking of leaving—”

“No-no-no. You—” she shakes her head and points at him. “You don’t get to talk to me about Clarke! You have no place telling me she’s upset or worried. Maybe you could’ve before—but not now.”

“Before?”

Madi hesitates. As their voices bounce through the hall, Bellamy grabs her elbow and leads her into an empty room. “Before what?”

She yanks her elbow back then softens, “Before, you made her so happy, Bellamy. And now—she’s upset and I am doing my best to cheer her up in your absence—”

“I am right here—”

“No, no you’re not.” Madi leans against a wall, “She hasn’t talked to you in days—”

The observation hits a nerve and adds an edge to his voice, “Yeah. I’ve noticed.”

“You noticed she hasn’t talk to you? But you somehow miss how you’ve broken her heart? I thought you were the heart, noticing those types of things, and she was the head—not the other way around.”

“I haven’t broken—” He leans towards her, “Clarke told you about the head and the heart?”

She tilts her head back, touching it to the cement wall and focusing on the ceiling. “Clarke told me everything.”

Bellamy swallows, “I didn’t break Clarke’s heart—”

“Do you know you’re basically the reason I met Clarke in the first place?”

“Don’t change the subject—”

She gapes at him, annoyed. “I am literally answering all your questions.”

“By telling me how you met her?”

“Yes. You remember how I recognized you when we met and led you to Clarke?”

“You mean last week—”

“Six years ago, you’re the one who led me to Clarke.”

“What are you talking about?” Bellamy questions her sanity. “I wasn’t even there.”

“But you were,” Madi smiles sadly. “You were always there…She found fruit that day. I remember hearing her excitement as she told you on the radio.” Their eyes meet as she repeats Clarke’s words. “‘Bellamy…I found berries. They’re not very sweet, but they’re beautiful.’” The words send a spark down his spine. “I heard Clarke talking to you before I ever saw her face. And I have heard her talking, pouring her heart out to you on that radio every day since…”

“Clarke talk-talked to me—on-on—”

“The radio. For 2,199 days,” Madi kicks off the wall. “On bad days, I told her to talk to you and you cheered her up. On good days, the empty static would laugh along with us. You were there during meals, at campfires, in the rover with us when we got lost. You were with Clarke the whole time…” She shakes her head and looks away from his distraught face. “You know, Clarke told me not to be mad at you for being different from the Bellamy in her stories. So, fine, you’re not the supportive guy in the static and you’re not the guy who clearly loved her in the stories—fair enough. But, Bellamy, every time she sees you with Echo she holds on to me a little tighter and I don’t know how to make her happy anymore…”

“N-no-no,” he trips backward as he reaches for a pillar. “It-it’s not that I didn’t—”

“Madi!” Clarke bursts through the door. “Do you know how worried I was? Bellamy why didn’t—” She notices his shocked expression. “What’s wrong with you?”

Somehow, he manages, “Did you radio me every day?”

“I-I-Yes,” she blurts out, rambling, “But—whatever Madi’s said—it’s not—”

“I love you,” seamlessly rolls from Bellamy’s mouth like it’s been on the tip of his tongue for years.

Her brow creases. Then, a smile tugs at her lips. He watches happiness return to her soul and beams at her.

“Whenever you did return to Earth and met us,” Madi smirks. “That’s what I hoped you’d say.”


	7. Child From Hell

“Clarke!” Monty hands her a plate as she joins her friends’ circle around the fire. “Nice of you to finally join us.”

“Oh, uh, thanks…” She takes the plate of food and sits between Madi and Harper. “…Is this the food Dizoya dropped from the sky to recruit—?”

Harper catches her gaze. “We thought it would be a shame to go to waste.”

“Fair enough,” Clarke nods and picks off a piece of fruit.

“You know,” Bellamy speaks up. “Madi was just telling us you guys ate fruit pretty much every day.”

“Fruit and fish,” Madi boasts.

She examines Madi. “How nice of her to shove it in your faces.”

“No-no,” Harper defends her. “Clarke, it’s fine—”

“We’re just glad you had good food to eat,” Bellamy finishes.

Still under Clarke’s glare, Madi explains, “So we can’t even tell them things you’ve already told them…” she adds pre-teen sarcasm, “That makes sense.”

“Madi.” Clarke warns.

“What do you mean,” Bellamy looks over Clarke to Madi, “Already told us?”

The girl sighs and shakes her head. “Nothing. Never mind.”

“Well,” Monty attempts to break the tension. “It’s certainly a treat for us after algae and rations.”

“That’s for sure,” Harper agrees.

Madi glows in admiration for Clarke’s friends. “I don’t think I could live on algae for 2,199 days.”

“Hmm,” Clarke ruffles Madi’s hair. “Sure, you could. You’re still the child from hell.”

Madi sniggers. “You haven’t called me that in a while.”

“The child from hell?” Bellamy inquires, clinging to the few details he’s learned about Clarke’s life in their time apart.

Madi brightens, “When we first met, she followed me, so I led her into a trap.”

“A bear trap, Madi,” Clarke corrects her. “A friggin’ bear trap.”

“You were fine!”

“Fine!?! The huge scar on my leg proves otherwise.”

“But you never gave up me,” Madi shares sweetly. “Because Clarke Griffin doesn’t give up anyone—it’s one my favorite things about you.”

“Mine too,” Bellamy agrees, addressing Clarke rather than Madi.

Clarke shifts uncomfortably. “Madi, we were literally the last two people on Earth. I had nothing better to do.”

“Right. My mistake. You give up on people all the time. Remind me,” Madi challenges her in the firelight. “How many times did you radio Bellamy, ‘cuz I forgot—?”

Bellamy, Monty, and Harper all react at once, speaking over each other.

“You radioed us?”

“What radio? Clarke, you called me?”

“The radiation must’ve blocked the signal.”

Clarke scoffs, pulls herself up, and tosses her plate on the ground. She starts to leave, passing Madi. “You really are the child from hell, you know that?”

“You were never going to tell him,” she pleads for understanding. “He deserved to know,” she reaches for her, but Clarke yanks her arm back as she walks away. Sensing her anger, Madi calls after her. “Clarke!”

Bellamy stands. The revelation makes his head spin and world around him seizes to exist—making it difficult to follow her.

Monty and Harper approach Madi. “Did Clarke really called Bellamy on the radio?”

“Every single day,” Madi interrupts Bellamy’s whirlwind. He looks at her and she confirms, “2,199 times.”

Bellamy runs after Clarke then; his heart leading him forward rather than his head. The three of them watch Bellamy enter her tent.

Harper gives Monty a playful nudge. “I knew they were meant to be!”


	8. The Head and the Heart

“Take her out,” Bellamy repeats Clarke’s words. Despite his back to her, he feels her intense glare on his back, full on determination. “How are we going to do that, Clarke? Have you thought about that? Do you have a plan—”

“I can do it.”

He turns to her then, unsurprised by her confidence. “That’s my sister. You’re not doing anything on your own.”

She meets his gaze. “Wanheda can dethrone Blodreina and remove her from power.” 

Bellamy’s eyelids drift down for the second time, struggling to retain a level head as buried fears threaten to rise to the surface.

“Monty, Harper,” he stands, but addresses them softly. “Can you give us a minute?”

The couple leaves without hesitation, closing the door behind them to give Bellamy and Clarke the room.

He crosses his arms. “What are you thinking?”

“Bellamy,” she takes a step towards him. “Octavia just took Madi away from me to be her second. I can’t lose her.”

“Oh, okay. So, your decision to take out my sister and risk things with Dizoya is a rash decision based on emotion and fear.”

Her forehead creases, “Of course not. How can you say that?”

“Just trying to understand here, Clarke.”

“Okay, then. Logically, you know that taking out Blodreina is the best thing for everyone. She’s in war that she can’t win and we know not to fight. I, as Wanheda, am able to both outthink her and outfight her.”

Bellamy shakes his head, “You talk about knowing not to fight and then your literal next sentence is about fighting my sister.” 

“I don’t think it’ll come down to a fight,” Clarke stands firm. “But I will if I have to.”

“My sister!”

She steps forward. “You’ve told me that’s not your sister, Bellamy! She’s changed and she’s a threat to all of us! Not just Madi—”

“Clarke! Your plan risks everything! It risks Octavia’s life, it risks Echo, Raven, and Murphy and Emori who are out on their own with Dizoya—not to mention your own life.” He waits for his words to sink in, finding her gaze and softening. “And that’s something I’m never going to be okay with. I already lost you once, I’m not doing it again.”

“Bellamy…”

“You’re talking about ending the cycle, ending a war and risking my sister’s life, the lives of everyone we love based on a plan coming from your heart.” He challenges her, “Not your head.”

Clarke softens with understanding. “Okay, so…What’s wrong with that?”

“Wh-what’s wrong with that?” He stares at her in astonishment. “We’re not going to keep our people alive by just listening to our hearts…” He tilts his head, “Come on, you taught me that. That’s what I held onto for six years.”

“The plan might’ve come from my heart—but my head worked through it enough to know it could end the cycle. The best plans could be the ones that combine the head and the heart, Bellamy.” She meets him at the table and he turns to her. Now face-to-face, she continues even softer. “But the heart has a strength to survive, a strength that holds on and keeps us going after the head has given up.”

He clings to each word, ever in awe of her; knowing within in them somewhere lay the story of how she survived for six years. “Are you talking about how you survived with Madi?”

“No,” she whispers and shakes her head softly. She leans her forearms on the table and fiddles with the laser-com radio in her hands. “Before I found Madi…I almost gave up.”

Horror mars through his expression. “What do you mean ‘gave up?’”

Clarke’s focus on the radio calms her somehow. She feels his intense gaze, but refuses to acknowledge it—both for his sake and her own.

“Clarke…” He tries again, desperate. “What do you mean?”

“I mean…” she turns the radio over between her palms. “I mean…when I couldn’t find food. I didn’t have water. My head didn’t have the strength to survive alone. So, before Madi came in to my heart—” she stops herself by biting her lip, knowing it wasn’t fair to continue.

He leans closer. “What, Clarke? Talk to me. Before Madi—”

“Before Madi came into my heart,” she tilts her head to look at him, letting a single tear fall. “You did.”

Inhale. Exhale. He breathes in her confession and his eyes widen as he comprehends the magnitude of it. “What?”

She smiles sadly and then drifts her attention back to the laser-com radio. She presses the speaker on and off, only to be met with silence. “There’s no static.”

“Clarke…”

“Funny, I was so used to the static when I talked to you…You know, the last thing I said to you? It was, what? A week ago now? I said something like ‘I don’t know why I still do this every day. Maybe it’s my way of staying sane—of not forgetting who I am—was.’” She scoffs to herself. “But, let’s face it, we’re not the people we were six years ago. The Bellamy I radioed every day is not the one standing before me. And right now—the only person keeping me sane is Madi.”

Tears threaten to spill over as he reaches for her, speechless.

Her softness cracks. She yanks herself from him and tosses the laser-com across the table. “I swear to God, Bellamy, if your sister takes Madi from me—neither of you will recognize the heart-fueled, head-driven Wanheda I become.”

“O-okay…Okay,” He reaches for her again, forcing a connection by pulling her to him and wrapping his arms completely around her. “Shhh…I got you” He whispers as Clarke breaks down. “I’m with you…I am always with you.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed Bellamy's discovery. I'd love to hear from you. Comments make me so happy!


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